The University of Chicago Booth School of Business (also known as Chicago Booth, or Booth) is the graduate business school of the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois. Booth has produced more Nobel Laureates in the Economic Sciences (28)[4] than any other school and is second only to the University of Cambridge in total. Formerly known as The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, Chicago Booth is the second-oldest business school in the U.S.,[5] the first such school to offer an Executive MBA program,[6] and the first to initiate a Ph.D. program in business.[5] The school was renamed in 2008 following a $300 million endowment gift to the school by alumnus David G. Booth. The school has the third-largest endowment of any business school.[7]

The University of Chicago Booth School of Business traces its roots back to 1898 when university faculty member James Laurence Laughlin chartered the College of Commerce and Politics, which was intended to be an extension of the school's founding principles of "scientific guidance and investigation of great economic and social matters of everyday importance." The program originally served as a solely undergraduate institution until 1916, when academically oriented research masters and later doctoral-level degrees were introduced.

In 1916, the school was renamed the School of Commerce and Administration. Soon after in 1922, the first doctorate program was offered at the school. In 1932, the school was rechristened as the School of Business.[3] The School of Business offered its first Master of Business Administration (MBA) in 1935. A landmark decision was taken by the school at about this time to concentrate its resources solely on graduate programs, and accordingly, the undergraduate program was phased out in 1942. In 1943, the school launched the first Executive MBA program. The school was renamed to Graduate School of Business (or more popularly, the GSB) in 1959, a name that it held till 2008.

During the later half of the twentieth century, the business school was instrumental in the development of the Chicago School of economics, an economic philosophy focused on free-market, minimal government involvement, due to faculty and student interaction with members of the university's influential Department of Economics. Other innovations by the school include initiating the first PhD program in business (1920), founding the first academic business journal (1928), offering the first Executive MBA (EMBA) program (1943), and for offering the first weekend MBA program (1986).[14][15] Students at the school founded the National Black MBA Association (1972), and it is the only U.S. business school with permanent campuses on three continents: Asia (2000), Europe (1994), and North America (1898).

In Chicago, the Booth School has two campuses: the Charles M. Harper Center in Hyde Park, which hosts the school's full-time MBA and Ph.D. programs, and the Gleacher Center in downtown Chicago, which hosts evening, weekend, and executive MBA programs. Chicago Booth also has a campus in London across from the Guildhall and a campus in Hong Kong.[16]

Chicago Booth offers Full-time, Part-time (Evening and Weekend) and Executive MBA programs. The University is also a major center for educating future academics, with graduate programs offering the A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in several fields.

Students in the Full-time MBA, Executive MBA, and Part-time MBA programs can concentrate in one or more of 14 areas, although some concentrations' required coursework may necessitate schedule modifications for students enrolled in the part-time program. The areas are:

U.S. News & World Report currently ranks Chicago Booth as the #1 business school (tied with Harvard Business School) in the United States.[27]U.S. News also ranked the school's executive MBA program #1[28] and its part-time program #2.[29] In 2017, The Economist ranked the school's full-time MBA program as #2 globally.[30]The Economist ranked Chicago #1 each year from 2012 to 2016.[30]

Bloomberg Businessweek ranked the school as the #1 business school in the United States in 2006, 2008, 2010, and 2012.[31] In 2017, Forbes magazine rated Booth as #7 among U.S. business schools.[32]

Chicago Booth Review is a magazine devoted to business research, particularly research conducted by Chicago Booth’s own faculty. In addition to covering new findings in finance, behavioral science, economics, entrepreneurship, accounting, marketing, and other business-relevant subjects, the magazine features essays from Chicago Booth faculty and other academics. It is published quarterly in print and several times a week online.

Chicago Booth Review is the most recent of several successive vehicles Chicago Booth has used to convey its intellectual capital to an outside audience. Starting in the 1960s, the school published the Selected Papers series, a collection of articles written by faculty members or excerpted from faculty speeches. In 1997, Booth launched Capital Ideas (ISSN1934-0060) as a separate newsletter featuring articles about faculty research. That subsequently evolved into a quarterly magazine, which in 2016 relaunched as Chicago Booth Review.